


A dreamer born in a Court of Nightmares.

by only15



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas, a court - Fandom
Genre: F/F, POV Morrigan (ACoTaR)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-13 20:20:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17494679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/only15/pseuds/only15





	A dreamer born in a Court of Nightmares.

Azriel laughed —a rich sound, one which had not been heard for decades— throwing back his head and clutching his abdomen with one scarred hand. The fawn smiled shyly, her shoulders relaxing.  
  
Mor bristled, her body tensing, looking at the way Azriel and Elain laughed together. She narrowed her eyes, focusing on the body gestures between the two. Their bodies —feet, even— were pointed at each other as were their eyes, a slowly forming bridge between them. This Mor knew well for she had felt that very same bridge of connection form with Andromeda when they first stood on the rink against one another.  
  
Perhaps, instead of bristling, she should be glad for Azriel. He was moving on from her. As a friend, she should be happy for him. As a warrior, she should be relieved, for now he would not hold back whenever they fought. As a woman, she should be grateful. He would not throw himself on the line for her as he did all those years, slowly chipping away at her self-worth and dignity while he believed he helped her.  
  
Grateful? There it was again— the simple error in thinking which never failed to warp Mor back into her bedroom, the very spot where she cowered beneath her father as he glowered and towered over her frail, weak self. There was one particular night, the night which changed everything for Mor— the night that made her who she was today.  
  
“Morrigan.” Her name as if it was something he had easily plucked from a field and could rip apart should he please. It was this way he said her name every second, minute, day, and year of her adolescence. He stood in the middle of the doorframe, his whole body tense as it always was.  
  
But she had grown up with so little of standards, so adjusted to being treated as a worthless little thing. Because of this, she had never thought there could be any other way he could address her. If her father could not see worth in her, his only child, first-born, what was there worth dignifying? Surely nothing.  
  
His face twitched, and he sharply whipped his head around as he sniffed for something —a something that Mor had been experiencing for two days now. As if in answer, she fought to hide her grimace as her stomach twisted with a piercing pain, threatening to knock her off of her feet. It was so painful the first night, she had to wrap a piece of her ripped dress around her mouth so it would muffle her scream.  
  
Her father stopped sniffing and laid eyes on her, the realization dawning on his cruel face, one of her nightmares. “You.”  
  
His eyes were burning, but at the same time, he was smiling an eery, wrong smile. “You bled for days now, and you did not think to tell your mother and I?”  
  
Mor was a coward but no fool. She knew what happened to girls her age when they first bleed —forced to be bred or sent off in an arranged marriage. Or worse, she had heard from Rhys’ mother. How Mor wished Rhys’ mother stood between her father and herself now. Perhaps Rhys’ mother would be able to convince her father to do… to do what? There was nothing Mor was good at —nothing except court manners, politics, and a whole lot of the traditional dances of the Court of Nightmares. She had bruises on her feet to show for the dreadful hours of dancing.  
  
“I did not want to alarm you both,” Mor explained uselessly, “I was afraid that my bleeding would interrupt with my dance lessons, father.”  
  
His gaze darkened, a shadow casting over his face suddenly. “Lies,” he said, his words laced with venom. “A coward and a liar, how quaint.”  
  
At this, Mor paled. She knew what came next, and it was far worse than the dance lessons she despised so deeply. Her father whipped around, his back to her, sweeping his coat back as he shut the door and the lock clicked almost instantly after. Then, shadows sealed around the very cracks of the door, shutting away any remnants of light slipping into her bedroom.  
  
No window, no door, no way out. She felt the panic rising in her, felt the terror threatening her to scream uselessly. But she had been through something like this with Rhys, when he locked her inside of his closet.  
  
“Let me out, Rhys! This isn’t fair!” Mor screamed, raining her fists down onto the closet door, then pulling on the knob. On the other side, she heard snickering, undeniably Rhys with his mischievous tricks as he held onto the knob tightly and pulled backwards with his full weight.  
  
“No, Mor, do you think the Attor will let you out just because you said, ‘this is not fair’?” Rhys laughed, but not in amusement. “No, it will not. It will leave you in there for weeks —months, even— until you shit yourself and rot to near death. Then, it’ll open the door, and by then you will no longer be friends with light, and you will scream from the glare of a small lamp. And the Attor will take great pleasure in this, Mor, and it will eat  you —rotten, pathetic, and all.”  
  
“Stop it, Rhys! Stop, I don’t want to play anymore. I don’t want to play anymore!” Mor sobbed, not listening to anything her cousin was saying. Maybe some part of her was listening, but it had already given up because it knew how pathetic and far gone she was to try to save herself from this or anything at all. Her fists were bruised and fingernails broken and still, she could not get out no matter how much she tried.  
  
“Shut up and stop mindlessly hammering on the door for just a Cauldron-damned second, would you?” Rhys yelled, a tone her had never used with her unless he was truly angry, startling her into pausing. She hiccuped from the throat-wrenching sobbing, nearly vomiting as she tried not to dry-heave from the claustrophobia.  
  
“You will get out of here. Do you know why, Mor? Because you are better than this, stronger than this. You will winnow out of the closet and pound me in the face until I get a bloody nose. You will do it,” he said simply and firmly as if she could really do it.  
  
But she could. She had winnowed once before when they played a game of tag out of sheer desperation to beat Rhys just once at the game. And she did. One second she was hundreds of yards away, running after Rhys as he flew a few feet off of the ground— the next, she was tumbling right into him and squealing in glory.  
  
“Focus, Mor, and apply yourself.” Her own voice meshed with Rhys’, their voices becoming one in her conscience as it guided her.  
  
“I will get out of here. I am better than this, stronger than this. I will winnow out of the closet and pound you in the face until you get a bloody nose. I will do it,” Mor recited as if in prayer, conjuring some kind of energy inside of her very depths of untouched power. No, not power —willpower.  
  
Her head pounded while she imagined herself looking at Rhys’ wings on his back as he tugged against the door, one of his ears pressed against the door to listen for her movement. She imagined herself throwing herself at him, sitting on top of him and pummeling him until he would cry.  
  
And she did, grinning down at Rhys’ bloody face. Only, Rhys didn’t cry at all —no, he only grinned right back at her.  
  
Mor stilled herself, evening out her breathing. She pushed her vomit down for what she was about to do. She could vomit later, perhaps, in the forest where there were no fortified walls keeping her in like a caged animal. She could vomit all she wanted there, out in the open and free, the snow-dusted evergreens towering over and all around her with nothing else in sight for miles, couldn’t she? No father to degrade her, no mother to ignore her, she could cry a river in peace.  
  
But why would she have to cry? She could run away and save the tears for another day. No breeding, no marriage. Where would she go, though? Would Rhys and his mother welcome her?  
  
And so, she winnowed herself far, far away from wherever she was, somewhere only she and Rhys knew —to the top of the cliff overlooking the Court of Nightmares.


End file.
